


Valuable

by Tyrols



Category: The West Wing
Genre: Episode: s01e04 Five Votes Down, F/M, First Bartlet Campaign, Flashbacks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-31
Updated: 2021-01-31
Packaged: 2021-03-18 12:54:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,101
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29118594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tyrols/pseuds/Tyrols
Summary: So, why did Mandy and Josh break up on July 9th?
Relationships: Josh Lyman/Donna Moss, Mandy Hampton/Josh Lyman
Comments: 5
Kudos: 48





	Valuable

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first West Wing fic and the first fic I have written in about 10 years, so bear with me. I have been out of the game for quite some time. Also, the timeline might not totally line up, so perhaps suspend a little belief in that regard.
> 
> Disclaimer: Characters and settings are not my own.

“Sarah Wissinger?” Mandy asked, exasperated.

Josh rolled his eyes as he walked into Donna’s cubicle, Mandy in toe. Donna kept her eyes on her work as they entered her area. She would not normally ignore her boss, but he was with Mandy and that was the last person she wanted to deal with today. She thought when she and Josh broke up last summer that would be the last she would hear from Dr. Madeline Hampton, but apparently Donna wasn’t going to get that lucky.

“Yes. A smoking jacket and a cigarette holder. Both declared items. I am clean as a whistle,” Josh said, clearly annoyed by her questioning. Donna, staring down at a report, tried to stifle a smile. At least she knew she was not the only one who was unhappy Mandy was there.

Handing Donna a folder, she finally looked up at Josh. He gave her a sidelong glance which reinforced everything she heard in his voice and the smile was getting harder to stifle now.

“You received this gifts on July 3rd,” Mandy went on.

Joshed turned back to Mandy. “I’m sensing trouble, but I can’t quite…”

“You and I didn’t break up until July 9th.” Donna could feel Mandy throw a nasty look her way, but she kept her expression even.

“And there it was right in front of my face,” Josh replied as he and Mandy left the cubicle.

Donna knew Mandy was not going to let this go anytime soon, because that was how she was. She could never let anything go and, more times than she could count, she wondered what Josh ever saw in her.

She thought back to the campaign, at the height of Josh and Mandy’s dysfunctional relationship, and remembered how she had ended up so involved in it.

FLASHBACK: BARTLET FOR AMERICA HQ, July 1998

Donna was trying not to listen, but their voices continued to elevate and she had distinctly her heard name more than once. She tried to concentrate on the press release she was typing up, but knowing Josh and Mandy were talking about her made her concentration on anything but what they were saying nearly impossible.

“Can we not do this here?” Josh shouted, looking around the room as Mandy’s yelling was attracting more and more stares from their fellow staffers. Donna, along with everyone else, could hear them clearly now.

“You’re not going to silence me, Josh!” she bellowed at him, her face livid.

Before Josh could respond, Donna watched Leo rushed over to them, looking extremely irritated. “Will you guys take this outside?” He snapped at them.

“Great idea, Leo,” Josh said, giving Mandy a harsh look. “Let’s go outside.”

Mandy, seeing the serious look on Leo’s face was clearly convinced and started towards the door in a huff. Josh followed her much more slowly, seemingly not wanting to face what was waiting for him when they were not in a room full of people. In spite of herself, Donna’s eyes followed him as he weaved through the desks towards the entrance. He caught her eye from across the makeshift bullpen and she tried to give him what she hoped was an encouraging smile.

He quickly looked away before yanking open the front door of the campaign headquarters to follow Mandy down the street. Donna’s face fell and she immediately turned back to her screen.

Donna did her best to return her focus to the press release she had been working on. She now had a stack next to her computer that needed to be done that afternoon after C.J. had taken her red pen to the words of junior staffers.

Determined to put Josh out of her mind, she forced herself to concentrate. Forcibly putting Josh Lyman out of her mind had been a significant part of what she did on this campaign, so she had plenty of practice. To her surprise, she had done such a good job of getting lost in her work and not thinking about Josh that she actually jumped when the phone rang.

“Bartlet for America. Josh Lyman’s office,” she said automatically into the receiver with her casual cheeriness. She barely listened to what the person from the Advance team in Nevada was saying to her as she saw Josh walk back in, looking, if possible, more miserable than when he left. Unlike last time, he did not look in her direction, but instead when straight to his office and slammed the door. Donna stared at the closed door across the room for a moment before she saw Mandy, also looking worse-for-wear, come back in.

C.J. approached her and the two women walked together towards the back of the headquarters, clearly looking for a place to speak privately. Donna turned her attention back to the closed door of Josh’s office.

It was not so much an office was a it was a makeshift cubicle with a door and honestly, she was surprised he was able to slam it. She ended her call with a quick, “I’ll have to call you back,” and putting the receiver down without waiting for a response. Her work on the press releases completely forgotten as well, she got up and crossed the room, ignoring the eyes on her back.

Taking a deep breath, she knocked gently.

“Go away,” Josh snapped from inside.

“It’s me,” she said just loud enough for him to hear. She held her breath as she waited for him to respond. Was he going to tell her go away too? Possibly. Her heart ached at the thought and she tried to push the feelings down.

After a few seconds of silence, she heard Josh say, “Come in.” Exhaling, she turned the knob and pushed the door open. With no windows, it was very dim, with only the overhead lighting from the bullpen shining over the top of the short walls.

Josh was sitting behind his disaster of a desk, head in his hands. Donna reached across the him to flip the lamp on when Josh looked up at her. He was already exhausted from the 18-20 hour days they were putting in, but she could see much more than just exhaustion on his face as he looked at her.

“You okay?” she asked, knowing the answer, but not sure how else to start. Even someone who didn’t know Josh Lyman could see he was clearly not okay.

“Mandy and I broke up,” he said. “Again.” Donna tried to stifle a smirk, not because wanted them to break up… well, not only because of that. But because Mandy and Josh had broken up every month since she joined this campaign in February.

She didn’t really know what to say, so she didn’t say anything. She just looked at him, wondering if he could see the question in her expression.

And she was not disappointed. “For good, this time,” he muttered.

“I think you’ve said that before,” she quipped without even thinking.

This actually got Josh to chuckle. “Yeah, I know,” he said, as he rubbed his hands aggressively though his hair in his typically Josh fashion. “But it’s really over this time.”

She wasn’t wrong when she said she had heard that before, but that knowledge didn’t keep her heart rate from going up or for the butterflies in her stomach to go into overdrive. “Do you want to talk about it? I’m a good listener,” she smiled.

He looked up at her again from his chair, his lips parted slightly, his eyes full of an earnest she did not yet understand. Donna honestly thought she might faint.

“Donna…” he said hesitantly, but not breaking eye contact with her. It was obvious he was struggling to find the words. A first for him, she thought. “It’s so stupid and unprofessional to even have this conversation,” he finally grumbled with some bitterness.

If she had any lingering doubts that this had something to do with her, they were quickly evaporating. She had heard them say her name more than once. She felt her stomach tighten as the seconds passed. “You can tell me,” she said, trying not to sound too anxious.

Josh chuckled nervously and finally looked away from her. “Donna,” he started again, “Please sit,” he gestured to the only other chair in the small room, which was covered, just like his desk, with files.

Donna stared at the chair and said, “I’m fine standing.” She looked back at Josh who was clearly stalling. “Josh, what is it?” Some of her anxiety was being replaced by frustration at this point and the butterflies had certainly been banished in that moment.

Josh sighed heavily. “I do not want you think you’re responsible for anything,” he started.

Donna rolled her eyes dramatically, but Josh continued.

“Mandy gave me an ultimatum: break up with her or fire you.” Donna stared at him, perplexed about the words he just said.

“I’m sorry?”

Josh took another breath and looked her straight in the eye. “Mandy told me she was no longer going to be my girlfriend as long as you were my assistant.”

Donna thought she now understood what authors meant when they described someone’s blood as going cold. She swept the files off the chair she had previously refused and sat down, looking anywhere but at Josh.

“I’m not really sure how to respond to that,” she said in a quiet voice. “What does me being your assistant have to do with your relationship with Mandy?” This should have been obvious to her pretty quickly, especially as she was already prepared for some part of their fight to have been about her, but it took her a more than a few minutes to wrap her mind around it.

Josh cleared his throat uncomfortably. “Well, Mandy has this…uh…crazy idea… that there is something going on between us,” Josh stuttered as he, again, dragged his hand through his hair roughly.

Donna’s head immediately shot up to look at him, “But there isn’t,” she said, perhaps bit too quickly. If she had been paying closer attention she might have seen the look of pain that, for the briefest moment, passed across Josh’s face.

“I know that,” he said, his voice sounding stiff. “And I have tried to tell her that, but she doesn’t listen. Ever. She gets an idea in her head and that’s it.”

They sat there in silence for some time, taking turns looking at each other, but never at the same time.

Donna finally broke the ice. In a voice so quiet it was barely perceptible, “You said you and Mandy broke up.”

“What?” Josh asked.

It was her turn now to clear her throat awkwardly. Louder this time, she repeated herself, “I said, ‘You said you and Mandy broke up.’” Her heart was definitely in her stomach as she watched him watch her.

He nodded his head slowly. “Yes, I did.” He gave her a small smile, the same one she had often been on the receiving end of. It wasn’t a full-on toothy grin, but it was enough to expose the dimples on both his cheeks and enough to make Donna’s knees week. She was glad she was not still standing.

“I don’t know what to say,” she replied sheepishly, feeling the heat rise in her cheeks. She looked away from that smile of his, dropping her head slightly so that her blonde hair created some camouflage for her burning face.

His voice strong now, Josh spoke. “Donna, when you walked into this office in February of this year and starting answering my phone as if I had already hired you, you told me I would find you valuable. And you were right. You know there is nothing—”

“Nothing you take more seriously than a presidential campaign,” Donna finished for him, looking up and giving him a large grin, red face be damned.

“Exactly!” he beamed. “And I need good people by my side if we are going to win this for the Governor. And that means you,” he finished.

Thinking she probably couldn’t take anymore without bursting into a million pieces, she stood up and reached for the door, still grinning. “On that note, I should probably be getting back to work.” Before she could leave though, he stood up and moved around the desk to face her.

“Thank you for everything,” he said before pulling her into a tight hug. As his arms encircled her waist, she hugged him back. The butterflies had certainly returned and she was pretty sure they had multiplied.

FIN.


End file.
